The power of deeply-held and deeply-vested belief is awesome. If a belief is bolstered with an organized system of supporting fabricated material or if a belief is important to one's feeling of security, the mind will do whatever is necessary to maintain the belief, hallucinating, if necessary. Belief can lift one to heroics or cause one to destroy oneself.
The phenomenon of distorted mental function is perhaps most clearly displayed in the personality of the religious 'true believer'. Belief is a large component in the mind of any individual deeply immersed in religion and is most noticeable in the resultant irrationalities and avoidance of information by these individuals. We see it in terms of the mindless and often hysterical expressions of their faith, their intolerance of other beliefs, and in their desperate struggles to maintain these beliefs in a real world which offers evidence only to the contrary. To maintain religious faith, vast amounts of information must be avoided, misinterpreted or distorted and any argument to support the belief must be seized upon, even though the argument will have been shown to be invalid. There is no room for intellectual integrity here. Reason is mutually exclusive with keeping the faith. As has been covered elsewhere, this cumulative avoidance of factual knowledge has devastating effects upon the individual and upon any culture.
The true believer characteristically will also try to impose their own irrationalities upon others. The believer lives in a world of opinion. Lacking objective referents, there is a desperate need for confirmation of their beliefs from others.
Individual delusions translate to group behavior, the institutions insuring popular indoctrination, maintaining dysfunctional syndromes. We can measure it in the political thrust of the religious 'Right', the mindlessness of religious bumper stickers, the heavy religious hand on school textbook selection committees and the mindless mobs that gather at abortion clinics. You can see it in the laws of the land in terms of codes, laws and regulations designed to impose a particular morality through prohibition of both behavior and commodities. You can see it in an almost universal approach to governing, that of authoritarianism, modeled on the god concept, where control is forcibly imposed, mindless of rationality, feasibility, or costs in terms of negative effects. Under authoritarianism, the natural autonomy of the individual is usurped and natural controls are not allowed to function. Authoritarianism is the predominate pathogen of human organizations.
The harmful effects of belief can be measured through comparative tests designed to measure inductive reasoning aberrations, levels of real (factual) knowledge, reactance to factual information and distorted perception. More palpably, it can be measured by the destructive systems and activities, shaped and maintained by law.
In the study of the human cognitive system, there is a tool that has been downplayed, if not dismissed by modern psychology. Perhaps the implications of what it is and how it works is, in itself, too threatening. That tool is hypnosis.
The effects of belief can be studied through the use of hypnosis. By using hypnosis as a means to insert ideas and belief packages, the conscious inductive reasoning processes can be evaded and the suggestions implanted directly into the subconscious. Since belief is largely a function of the subconscious, we should not overlook those tools and techniques best suited to communication with the subconscious. Thus, the use of hypnosis. It is the most effective means of inserting information into the subconscious with a relatively high degree of control and within a short time frame. The operator is able to achieve some control of both the nature and extent of the belief, as well as the relative level of suppression of the inductive reasoning processes.
The method of insertion appears to have no bearing on the way the subconscious uses information, other than in terms of the amount of supporting material that will be in place. Implanted ideas will be used according to its labeling. Where the inductive reasoning processes have been by-passed, the material will be taken at face value, as true. The function of the subconscious in these matters is automatic.
Hypnosis is an altered state wherein the operator distracts or lulls the inductive (critical reasoning) processes into inactivity and communicates directly with the subconscious. The usual screening of received information, by the conscious mind, is reduced or its repression is virtually complete. Effective hypnosis is mutually exclusive with inductive reasoning.
Once the subject is placed in a trance state, the operator can communicate directly with the subconscious, implanting information and taking advantage of its passivity and its inability to reason inductively.
Perhaps the most successful hypnotist who ever lived was the late Dr. Milton Erickson, MD, of Phoenix, Arizona. Early in his career, Dr. Erickson came to recognize that alert consciousness was not continuous, but fragmentary and fleeting. Much of the time an individual lapses into a condition of non-thought wherein they are open to suggestion. Erickson crafted an induction technique that took advantage of these momentary lapses of critical awareness. He would watch for minute signs of these lapses, having a system of suggestions at the ready. When the lapse occurred, Erickson would use a word or a gesture, weaving these into conversation, setting the subject up for the trance state. The effects of these suggestions were designed to be cumulative. At the proper moment he would provide the key suggestion and the subject would immediately slip into trance.
Hypnosis, and other forms of subliminal insertion, are the only processes by which you can insert a belief package that would otherwise require months or years of indoctrination with the subject being under controlled conditions. It is the most effective means of instantly internalizing material for what-ever purpose.
In chapter four I talked about inductive and deductive reasoning. In the waking state, the mind can make discriminations, i.e., reason inductively. In the trance state (subconscious), the mind cannot. In a deep state of hypnosis, the mind can only do deductive reasoning.
While in the waking state, material implanted through hypnosis can perform like any other internalized material, being 'kicked' into consciousness in the form of motivation or conceptualization for a particular behavior, complete with instant rationalization of that behavior.
In deep hypnosis, a subject can be told by the operator that he or she is a chicken and will accept the suggestion literally and without question. All of the 'chicken' behavior will have been deduced from the subject's stored concepts of chicken. The subconscious will not be able to make the simple distinction of not being a chicken because the determination requires inductive reasoning.
During my early college days, friends and acquaintances would often gather where I was living. Together with a friend and fellow student, also involved in hypnosis, we would hold hypnosis sessions. On one of these occasions, I had a subject in a deep trance, a young engineering student, male, about twenty years old and with a very high I.Q., about 180, as I recall. In the process of bringing him out of a trance, on one occasion, I was giving him suggestions of well-being in order to prevent any post-trance feelings of stiffness, drowsiness, etc. In the process, I inadvertently used the phrase, 'You will be merry.'. The subject interpreted 'merry' to be 'Mary' and came out of the trance believing that he was a woman!
He had taken the character from a novel he had recently read and had instantly enmeshed this story with his real life, mine and our circle of friends. It was an elaborate concoction in which delusions and hallucinations abounded. There were a number of people present during the session, all of them friends and acquaintances. He had assigned them new identities and new meanings to our surroundings. He saw things that weren't there and failed to see things that were. The whole fabrication was achieved almost instantly.
At first, I thought he was joking. When I suggested that we could prove he was not a woman by stepping into the bedroom and pulling down his pants, I suddenly had nearly two hundred pounds of angry 'woman' on my hands!
Conscious reasoning or discussion would not touch the delusion. He refused to discuss it, or to even think about it, a common first line of defense for one harboring beliefs. The problem was heightened by the trance having been too deep for him to remember the suggestions I had given him. His high I.Q. was no defense against such delusion and, to the contrary, his keen visualization capabilities made the situation even more real to him. I had to place him in trance again in order to neutralize the 'Mary' suggestion and subsequent delusions.
Once false information is accepted as true, it will do its dirty work. Such is the power of the belief system. Consider, for a moment, the various peoples of Earth and how predominantly misdirected are their lives, reflecting the ideas and attitudes of their various cultures. Consider how few of their beliefs are reflections of reality and you will begin to grasp the enormity of the problem, and better understand the wholesale irrationality you see in every human culture. The overwhelming preponderance of human behavior is a reflection of human perception.
Regardless of the source of a belief, its effects will be very similar. Some of the factors which affect the strength of a belief are: Has the belief been held for a long or short period of time (how completely oriented has the personality become to the unexamined material)? Has a system of supporting material been established? How extensive is it? Has the material been confronted on a conscious level before now? What is the individual's vested interest in this belief? What are the relative cultural pressures for or against holding the belief? How generalized has the belief become; how much of the personality does the belief involve?
The effects of false material inserted through hypnosis produces instant belief structure which has not been previously confronted on a conscious level, thus, no reasoned and verbalized support has been developed; immediate mental distortions are required for the defense of the inserted material. It is instructive, not only from the standpoint of demonstrating psychological mechanisms and the power of beliefs to motivate, but in the diverse rationalization the subject may follow in attempting to justify and support the belief. Hypnosis provides a viable tool for investigating the effects of belief, an area little explored by psychology, in terms of pathology.
The cognitive system is comprised of learned material which has been categorized and internalized with some value assigned, as being true or false, relevant, not relevant, etc. Internalized, it becomes a determinant of the personality and will effect subsequent reasoning and behavior. It will even have an effect on the physiology.
In an age when everything is viewed as simply a matter of opinion, where perception counts for more than evidence, belief or faith is held as desirable, if not essential. In every culture other premises might be questioned from time to time, but not belief, not faith. This attitude is the foundation upon which all delusion and all perverted systems rest. Beliefs must be protected at all costs. It becomes a cultural imperative.
We commonly refer to the human cognitive system as the belief system. The tendency is to call any accepted idea a belief. However, a cognitive system will always contain both factual knowledge and material that has been accepted on faith alone. As such, "Belief System" is seen as an inadequate label. There is a vital need to distinguish between belief and knowledge. The easiest way to do this is to assign the word "belief" as representing "the acceptance of concepts in the absence of objective evidence". Any such material that is supported by objective evidence or indices is knowledge. As better material becomes available, knowledge is readily modified or upgraded.
A belief is an idea or system of ideas that has been accepted without supporting evidence or validation. Any such concept or tautology will be riddled with errors. Any concept will be incomplete, at best, and will need modification as more or more accurate information becomes available. Not only is belief invariably adrift from factual reality, it is not amendable. It is not something one expects to change.
Thus, the term "cognitive" system is preferable to "belief" system, because it will contain both the valid and the invalid. "Cognitive system" will be used herein accordingly.
We have been carefully propagandized from birth. Much of what we have accepted as true has never been confronted except in terms of defensive moves and mechanisms that will allow us to maintain those beliefs.
Now societies are confronted with the cumulative problems resulting from these delusions, problems which are compounded by overpopulation, degenerating environments, unrestricted growth of government and the continued indoctrination and enforcement of delusion by our governing institutions. Barring a marked transition from belief to knowledge, humanity and its productive systems will eventually be overwhelmed by the problems generated by belief, triggering a precipitous degeneration and wholesale destruction of life on this planet.
Humanity's most vital need is for increasing numbers of individuals to recognize the real nature of the problems. Only then will necessary pressures be brought to bear on our institutions to bring about corrective changes. We cannot expect the institutions to lead the way. If they do change, they will be dragged kicking and screaming every step of the way. There is a question as to how far an adult will move in a self correction process. The problem is one of motivation. Not only is one confronted with RCE, which generates emotional bias in favor of the existing cognizance, correction requires activity counter to emotional bias, as well as counter to a lifetime of habits largely shaped for the accommodation and preservation of beliefs. There is also an absence of vital knowledge, the inescapable ignorance that attends belief.
Part of that vital knowledge is a general understanding of the basic nature and principles of existence. Given our current popular mentality, the absence of this knowledge will seem normal. The gaining of it will be seen as a staggering undertaking, if not impossible to many people. However, this is not really the case. The material must be explored only to a depth sufficient to impart a recognition of its inescapable validity. Those without this basic framework will have little confidence in their own ability to make determinations, and will have insufficient motivation to wean themselves from authority.
On the surface, not knowing how existence works at the level of the primary particles would appear to be no handicap. After all, most people have little or no knowledge of how electricity works, but it doesn't deter them from using it.
There is a difference. A light switch does not constitute a threat to one's foundation premises. Understanding the basic mechanisms of existence provides wide vistas of insight, devastating to religious belief and authoritarian governing.
Out of understanding the fundamental mechanisms comes insight and recognized implications that existence is a continuum, that human drives originate internally, that existence is ultimately a unity, that every existence is based on this system, etc. When one looks at human activities in light of this knowledge, one quickly gets a feeling for the necessities and precursors that would be required for effective human systems. There is no area of human function that an understanding of the basic mechanisms will not enhance, including the job of overcoming a lifetime of misdirection.
Under humanity's delusional systems, nowhere has a pool of individuals been rational enough to have affected a governing system that was truly self-correcting. So far, our problems are being increasingly compounded by governments largely out of control, reflecting the same belief system pathologies as ancient cultures. As populations grow, the dysfunction of governing systems become compounded and more critical.
The basic nature of problems remain largely unrecognized, although this pattern may be changing. There appears to be increased popular resistance to cultural delusion and resultant social dysfunction.
Similar to a society, an individual harboring large amounts of false information will experience high levels of conflict, stress, feelings of insecurity and dysfunction. There is always something in the environment that is threatening to this type of cognitive structure and, thus, one sees a continued, desperate grasping for material to support and justify. The very scarcity of such support and the essential emptiness of such a life, cause the believers to huddle together, telling each other what they want to hear and providing refuge in a world that only offers evidence contrary to their beliefs. The deluded masses, having been relieved of the courage and the integrity of independent thought, seek an environment devoid of serious intellect, where relative mindlessness is the norm. In so doing, they deny themselves both growth and freedom.
Any rationality must start with a foundation of reality-reflecting knowledge and experience. Unfortunately, many people are so filled with fantasy material, its basic structure established in childhood, that they are virtually void of any such foundation. Two cases come to mind, as being severely handicapped. Both of these were college students attending a western university. One, a young man, was an American Indian from one of the Western reservations. The other, female, had been raised a strict Roman Catholic, having attended only parochial schools. Although these two students came from widely different cultures, the effects of their fantasy-filled belief systems were most similar. They were both freshmen at the time and, as seen in retrospect, were both suffering culture shock from the material they were being exposed to.
The shock was generated by compulsory exposure to material which was in high conflict with their beliefs, particularly their most fundamental premises. Both were extremely unhappy and were rejecting (failing to understand) much of the material in the areas of conflict. The Indian dropped out of school, returning to the reservation and, as I was told later, the girl entered a convent.
We find, not only learning disabilities, distortions in logic and mental illness as a pathology of belief, but the whole spectrum of destructive human behavior. This includes all forms of functional irrationality, not only as exhibited by individuals, but as expressed by groups, organizations and institutions, the whole spectrum of human strife.
Ironically, active at the roots of all irrationality is RCE, the natural process of reciprocal cognitive exclusion, our natural defense mechanism which functions to protect, maintain and unify individual cognizance. It is a system of learned and instinctual defense mechanisms, all serving the purpose of maintaining existing cognizance by generating emotional reactance to material that is in conflict with what has been internalized. Of course, RCE also serves to protect and further real knowledge, in areas where such knowledge has been internalized. Had we shed our cultural myths and delusions, in pace with the progress we were making in science and technology, RCE would now be working for us, not against us.
The human animal has a much greater problem with discrimination than the lower animals because of having to deal with symbolic or conceptual falsehoods of considerable complexity. The use of language is inconsistent. It is riddled with the shifting meanings of words. Ambiguity, semantics and convolutions in reasoning are largely designed to accommodate the fantasies and falsehoods. Conflicting ideas at the conscious level tend to paralyze behavior, necessitating the rejection of conflicting material or its repression below the level of consciousness. Is it any wonder we exhibit such large measures of irrationality?
Any perceived conflict generates discomfort, producing a drive to reject the offending material. Unification requires both acceptance and rejection of information, the inductive reasoning component of consciousness becoming the discriminating agency. But the game is rigged. Somewhat like our legal system, what has been accepted functions as precedent to determine what will be accepted in the future.
A reasoned response directed toward discovering the factual reality will not occur unless the individual is predominantly reality oriented or has been trained to check premises. Unless the individual has been trained to question his or her own assumptions, offending material will be neutralized. No progress will have been made.
Because the conscious is so dependent upon material fed to it by the subconscious, you can see what a closed system this tends to be. The only relief, from this system of cues and responses, is feedback from the external environment being received and accepted by the conscious mind, to function as a standard of reality and a source of new information. In the absence of accepted feedback from one's environment, the individual is left on the circular treadmill of his or her own tautology.
Without accepted factual input from the external environment, the individual is left with a closed system, completely at the mercy of existing beliefs, unable to learn, unable to correct, unable to grow. All forms of functional neurosis and psychosis have, in common, this blocking or distortion of real-world input, a loss of factual input necessary for correction.
All functional mental illness will be attended by circular reasoning, tautologies which do not admit factual external feedback relative to the delusions. All such pathology represents closed systems, the individual being unable to accept external reality-reflecting information which would allow belief rejection and a reduction of conflict. The disturbed individual has no means of changing or of affecting fundamental tension reduction.
RCE expresses the drive for integrity, security, etc. Any animal will strive to maintain a comfortable sense of security. The human animal is no exception. This includes more than physical safety, shelter from the elements and enough food. In the human animal, considerable knowledge about one's environment is necessary before a feeling of security can be achieved. There must be a sense that he or she can deal with any problem which might arise. A feeling of well being usually attends a belief that you understand, and therefore can predict and deal with your environment. This seems to constitute an inborn bias toward truth. Most of our cultural delusions would probably disappear in the absence of propaganda continuing to issue from our institutions.
This knowledge related security is an innate drive common to all autonomous animals. Eg., a pet cat, when taken to a new home, will explore every room, nook and corner until it feels at comfortable. A dog will also explore and, very quickly, move to mark and guard its new territory.
In the human animal, this drive for security requires the individual to also hold an integrated conceptual system regarding one's external environment. Conflicting beliefs means uncertainty. Conscious gaps in knowledge and contradictions are sources of stress.
Any belief must be made to appear to reflect reality. The mechanisms of RCE are central to this delusional process. Our minds will always labor to provide us with a perceived integrated set of beliefs. When consistency does not exist in fact, our minds will maintain it by delusion. Usually this is accomplished by minor distortions of perception and interpretation. If necessary, however, our minds will provide full-blown hallucinations.
Regardless of what we believe, there is an inborn imperative to see our own beliefs as being true, consistent and free of contradictions, or in some way excused, otherwise, we will experience stress accordingly.
We must believe that we have the inside track, the true picture. This sense of integrity or unity is essential to our feelings of security. Of course, if this integrity is based on false concepts, the security is delusional.
As an instrument of ethical and rational behavior, belief is fully as effective as a square wheel. It is for this reason that objective evidence should always be the basis for accepting or rejecting any information.
As has been stated elsewhere, the brain is a highly evolved and effective mechanism for detecting reality. It has an innate evolved capacity to recognize contradictions and to sense the realities. These capacities began to appear in animals long before the advent of symbolization and language. These faculties of the brain are blunted only through the introduction of large amounts of false material into the subconscious. Even then, the individual is never completely adrift from reality and experiences the internal conflicts between belief and reality. Unfortunately, the drive for security often sends the individual in the direction of fantasy and delusion.
The largest externally organized package of false material found in a belief system is usually relevant to religion, however, the pathology does not end there. Because of the mechanism of RCE, a large involvement with religious belief also insures a commensurately devastating absence of factual knowledge, its rejection having been made necessary in the process of maintaining the belief. Core or fundamental false ideas not only cause a learning disability, but insure pathological levels of ignorance.
One of the most attractive aspects of religion is that it offers packaged answers to many questions, in areas where people feel insecure. The answers may have nothing to do with reality, but, when believed, will provide a similar sense of well being and even allow the individual to cope and be more functional within certain parameters of activity. Further, it relieves the believer of a lot of work and responsibility. The belief explanation will be superficial and, unfortunately, will preclude deeper inquiry. There is a lot less work in believing that 'Gawd did it!' than in gaining an understanding of what is really going on. Further, the believer is laying off responsibility for his or her own well-being on the Big Daddy in the sky. The believer never truly matures; never loses dependency upon the father figure or upon authority.
A large part of female insecurity in the American culture is associated with a lack of knowing how things work. There is a feeling of helplessness in the face of so many things that can go awry. Our culture doesn't encourage little girls to explore, experiment and learn about the physical universe. Too often little girls grow up with little sense of the nature of their physical world. Add to this the fact that the female has the role of keeper of the nest and tender of the young and you can immediately see the potential for passing on her own fears and delusions to her children.
She has traditionally had a station in life that was more conducive to introspection than the male, with his roles of hunter and warrior, of necessity being more externally oriented. She has usually been excluded from determining much of the conceptual material the group operates on and has come to rely on authority and her feelings rather than factual evidence. Probably more so than the male, her decisions are emotionally based rather than reasoned, although, in terms of fundamental questions, there appears to be no difference. Her role has probably made the woman more vulnerable to myth and superstition than the male and having correspondingly less knowledge and ability to deal with the physical environment.
The peoples of Central and South America are heavily influenced by religion, especially Roman Catholicism. As one would expect, families are largely authoritarian. This accounts for much of the 'macho' stance, and low ability to resolve conflicts, so common with Latin men. When confronted with women who begin to think and move independently, as one finds in the United States, they have difficulty dealing with it, often resorting to violence.
The teachings of Roman Catholicism tend to consign women to the role of chattel, owned by the male and pledged to obey. Women within the church are increasingly rejecting this concept and the resulting mistreatment it tends to produce.
As has been emphasized, the subconscious mind cannot recognize contradictions. A healthy conscious mind can, and routinely does so, as part of its normal function. It will automatically pick up on conceptual material which is in conflict with the external reality. It continually tries to align itself with the real functions of existence. An important supplemental function to reality orientation is provided by what appears to be sub-conscious or preconscious activities of the mind and body, that of reality-testing.
Reality testing helps to keep the individual reality-oriented (literally in touch with the physical environment). Its simpler forms can be observed as touching activity or other behavior that generates a tactile sensing of the immediate environment, e.g, idly drumming one's fingers or rubbing something, scratching, stretching, pressing against something, etc.
Without a continuing stream of stimuli from the external environment, the individual soon becomes disoriented. There is increasing confusion and a loss of self-confidence. Experiments in sensory deprivation bear out this confusion and loss of reality-orientation.
Without a firm sense of self, or centering, in relation to one's environment, there appears to be a subsequent loss of effectiveness. Problem solving becomes impossible in cases where one loses the ability to discriminate, ejecting the nonessentials and the irrelevant.
When beliefs permeate the personality, the individual has little chance of ejecting them and programs additional delusion to bolster the pathology. This process, unchecked, eventually results in psychosis, loss of the ability to distinguish reality from fantasy.
On the occasion of visiting a state mental hospital, in Pontiac, Michigan, a college group I was with was introduced to a one of the patients there. This was a lady who was introduced as Mrs. X, who would tell us something about the institution.
This particular lady dressed and maintained the bearing of a society matron. She was well educated (apart from her defective cognizance) and carried herself with regal grace and charm. Her manners and deportment were impeccable. Although she was institutionalized, she carried off her delusions (obviously with the support and some help from the staff) with the greatest authenticity I had ever witnessed.
She believed that she was the Matriarch of a very wealthy family that had willed the land, and provided the financial resources, to build and operate the hospital, and which supervised its operation. She believed she ran the place.
She graciously welcomed us and gave a short lecture about the hospital and her family, all very convincing. After she had concluded this hostess function and left the room, we were told of one of her escapades.
A load of furniture had been ordered, from Hudson's Department Store in Detroit, to be delivered by truck to the hospital. Madame X happened to be strolling the grounds, when the truck from Hudson's arrived at the hospital. Approaching the driver, she inquired if she could be of assistance. When the truck driver asked her where the furniture was to be unloaded, she explained who she was and informed him that she had not ordered any furniture.
The driver showed her the invoice and the furniture. She explained to him that whoever had ordered the furniture had done so without her authorization, that only she had the authority to do such a thing and that she would certainly not have chosen pieces of such poor quality and design. The furniture was returned to Hudson's.
There are a couple of things that can't be stressed enough. First, that reality is just that. It is real stuff. Even the mysterious primary motion that is at the basis of it all is real stuff. The fact that we have no means of addressing it until it is cycling in stable patterns in no way diminishes its reality. Our inability to detect it or examine it below the level of structure is our limitation, not the limitation of primary motion. The fact that we cannot understand the essence of existence as being perpetual motion, cycling massless motion at the speed of C, in no way diminishes its reality. This is what the numbers tell us, and is the only way the geometry will work. This is what the evidence says, and until there is further clarification, there is no objective alternative than to accept this scenario.
There are no contradictions in nature. Every single idea we hold (not a system of ideas, but each single concept) is either true or false, in terms of the degree it reflects factual reality. There are no 'gray' areas. If you find a 'gray' area, you are looking at a system of ideas, wherein there will be elements of both truth and fallacy. In other words, you need to take a closer look and further break down the material.
Either an idea, a single concept, reflects reality or it does not. Either something exists in a particular way or it does not. Often, the 'gray' areas may represent reality symbolically or analogically, but remain worthless in terms of being a guide for activity. We need to check premises and discriminate further. Again, taking a closer look will provide us with the necessary material for finding the reality.
In many cases, we may not be informed enough to know whether or not an idea reflects reality. This does not alter the principle. Either something exists or it does not. It cannot partially exist any more than a woman can be partially pregnant.
If you visualize a mythical beast, such as the cockatrice, as found in the Old Testament of the Bible, with the wings of a bird and the head and body of a snake, that visualization does not make it real. You can draw a picture of one or write a story about one or even believe they exist, but these things will bring it no closer to reality. No matter how realistic the picture is or how truly you might believe, the absurd will be no closer to factual existence. Regardless of how it is packaged, an untruth remains an untruth.
The essence which separates man from the lower forms of animals is increased intelligence and symbolic reasoning. Mental symbolization allows for vast storage and manipulation of information. As our intelligence increases, as a species, more and more of our behavior becomes learned and dominates our instinctual behavior.
Volitional learning follows a pattern of input, conceptual manipulation and production, in terms of successive approximation. This simply means that information is gathered, mental processing takes place and then the individual attempts to 'use' the new knowledge, becoming better at it with successive attempts. There is one other factor we must not forget. That is feedback, cognizance of the effectiveness of using the knowledge. Without feedback from our environment, there is no means to monitor our efforts and the correction process. We progress no further.
From the moment of exposure to new material, there is also input from internal sources. The mind manipulates the material from both sources, the external and internal relevant counterparts and supplementals, until some acceptable conceptualization is achieved. There is then experimental use of the modified cognizance. In a rational (mentally healthy) individual, the successive approximation phase of learning is one of absorbed focus on the task with relatively little stress generated by the feedback. Successive approximation means experimental use of the information. As such, it does not constitute a threat.
In the healthy individual, this activity is followed by accepted feedback from the effort, adjusted activity, etc. The individual approximates the changing conceptualized model, gaining skill with successive attempts. As the conceptual model and the behavior is successively modified, the process gradually brings the two closer together. As skill and knowledge is gained, a condition of harmony is achieved between the conceptual and the physical. If the conceptualization or the feedback is in any way in conflict with the cognizance of the individual, e.g, if the level of performance is unacceptable to the individual, stress will be generated and an avoidance reaction will be triggered, such as the individual losing interest in the project.
If the activity implies or constitutes information in conflict with the belief system, the individual may have such a strong aversion that the successive approximation stage is never reached. Disruption of any phase of the sequence, for whatever reasons, will result in defective learning. This process is similar whether one is learning to read, formulate an integrated philosophy or ride a bicycle. Cognizance of the conceptual material is not enough. Effective learning takes place only in the dynamic process of expressing the knowledge. As acceptable levels of performance are obtained, this material is internalized and takes on reflex-like qualities, being called forth by environmental cues without the need of conscious deliberation.
Where there is only memorized material without the validation process and without active use of the material, an understanding of its implications and effective use with other reality-related materials is never reached. The material can only be repeated as a formula, such as a 'rule of thumb' or slogan.
As education progresses, ever-increasing amounts of learned material and behavior become internalized. The learning behavior is characterized by joint control by both the conscious and the subconscious faculties of the mind. The behavior is automatic for most routine acts with the conscious coming into play to deal with variations which must be reasoned through. As has been indicated, very little behavior is purely conscious. Most acts spring forth from subconscious sources, triggered by cues with only minor adjustments by conscious reasoning.
Much of what we learn is through torrents of symbols. As you read this book, these words (symbols) evoke images and concepts in your mind. These concepts are often very complex and have taken a large part of your life for you to become fluent with. The transmission of these ideas and concepts through the written word represents the primary means of gaining knowledge in a technological society.
Humans are special in the animal kingdom in their enhanced ability to learn. The capacity to reason in symbols has allowed us to gain an understanding of the Earth environment, which now reaches to the very essence of existence. This ability to reason has become our most vital tool for survival, and will have to be used in large measure if our kind are to long survive.
The factor which makes learning of large quantities of information possible is that, when something is learned, it takes on reflex-like qualities, freeing the mind for further learning tasks. If the individual had to think through each thing he or she had learned in order to use it, there would a saturation point reached very quickly. Instead, learned information is stored within the subconscious and is triggered in packages when needed.
As marvelous as human learning capacity is, there is one factor which could well tip mankind in the direction of degenerative evolution, if not extinction. This factor centers around the teachings the human animal receives while not yet in possession of intellectual tools necessary for self-defense. The child is defenseless in the face of concepts received before being able to critique those teachings.
The young child looks upon adults, especially parents, as virtual gods, who know all things. What a parent teaches a very young child is largely accepted without question. The young child accepts a large part of the belief structure of the parents and the existing adult world. This belief structure, loaded with false material, forms a foundation for the child's own cognitive system and strongly influences the acceptance or rejection of further information.
Usually, the child's belief system is so thoroughly loaded with false material that it forms substantial barriers to learning before the child reaches school age. Such early teachings does irreparable damage to the child's capacity to learn and to reason effectively. Cultural falsehoods are so far-reaching and all-pervasive that there is little factual information that does not pose a threat to existing beliefs. Unless these discrepancies are resolved, the threat to the child's security becomes so great that its self-confidence is seriously undermined. One can expect that a major reason for our high level of school drop-outs begins on the mother's lap.
Routinely, mothers carefully fill the minds of their little ones with material which, in most cases, will permanently cripple the child, instilling the most devastating form of learning disability. As the child grows, there is a continuous adjustment to environment and the family constellation. The human baby is not even 'all there' at birth, incomplete neurologically and undeveloped emotionally. Along the path to maturity, the child will accept some ideas and reject others. He or she will choose and reject role models, accommodate and manipulate and, in general, develop the life style which will dominate adulthood. There will be a continuous change in personality and the formation of attitudes and emotionality with which the individual will face life as an adult.
If these attitudes seriously conflict with cultural norms, certainly the individual's ability to function the society can become impaired. Becoming reality oriented, itself, is against cultural norms and has this down side. But, somewhat of a catch 22, reality orientation, by large numbers within a population, is necessary for effective systems and the ability to make corrections and solve problems. The philosophy of "If you want to get along, go along." only insures slavery and the eventual downfall of the society.
Often the child will thoroughly reject a parent as a role model and find other, more acceptable, models to choose from. Inductive reasoning usually has little to do with the choices, however. The young child is not equipped to make complex intellectual decisions, but largely imitates behavior that brings some degree of emotional satisfaction.
The individual will always protect his or her belief system and, for the multitude, the question of truth is not even part of the determining equation. Only the individual who recognizes the effects of false information and the rewards to be gained through factual knowledge, will have a systematic means, and the motivation, for self-correction. Only such an individual will habitually seek the reality and be on guard against propaganda.
One's emotions reflect a compromise, an algebraic summation, as it were, of physiological drives, knowledge, beliefs and desires. We cannot expect our emotions will always be in the direction of rational behavior. For obvious reasons, our emotions usually reflect high levels of conflict among the various drives. e.g: One is often torn between an intellectual determination and our emotions which are too often in a different direction. As one might expect, the emotions provide the primary means of manipulating human behavior.
As beliefs are replaced by knowledge there will be a gradual shift in our emotional predispositions, becoming more supportive of rational choices, but conscious retraining should accompany the changes. Much of our predisposition will be largely affected by established habit patterns. Whether rational or irrational, our activities will be emotionally biased.
The more false information within the belief system the more difficult it is to avoid conflicting information. A person immersed in a fundamentalist religion probably has about the most acute problem of this type. Regardless of the dressing one gives it, an untruth is forever untrue. religionists are confronted daily with a universe and a society which conflicts with their beliefs, on all sides. They respond by withdrawing within their own group. In this non-threatening environment, they can tell one another what they wish to hear and no one will point out a contradiction, an absurdity or otherwise cause them to question or examine their beliefs. The world is labeled 'sinful', providing them with a rationale for withdrawing behind their wall of 'divine truth'.
However, in modern society, such escapism is not entirely possible. An individual is usually a member of more than one group. In order to earn a living, most people have a job which forces them to be a member of a job group. Then, if they have any special interests such as sports, or a hobby, they may become a member of such a special interest group. It becomes pretty difficult to avoid information which conflicts with one's beliefs. This need to protect beliefs, and gain one's objectives, drives the formation of ethnocentric groups or subgroups within a society, where beliefs vary strongly from those outside the group.
The amount of closure of the group, how great the barrier to intercourse with the outside, will be in direct proportion to the perceived. The religionist is an extreme example which I keep coming back to, because such groups and individuals have cognitive systems based upon the largest amounts of false information. As such, they are the groups and individuals who have to go to the most extreme measures in the defense of their cognitive systems. They will experience the greatest conflict with their environment. Many cults and religions are severely limited in their intercourse with outsiders. Their worlds become very small, their ignorance levels devastating.
The Freudian concept of compartmentalization is superfluous since the subconscious has no mechanism that can discern a contradiction. Only the conscious has the ability to make such a determination. Subconscious material can and does generate high levels of stress and tension, however. As this material is used, being brought into consciousness, falsehoods come in conflict with the external realities.
Another form of conflict is when an individual's natural drives conflict with that person's beliefs. The problem of frustration, stress and decompensation can become acute, the individual truly being at war with him or herself. Defense mechanisms often become accordingly desperate. Such mechanisms as projection, symbolic or ritualistic or compulsive behavior bring some measure of relief or symbolic absolution.
As internal stress becomes acute, inappropriate behavior is increasingly exhibited. Increasing amounts of energy are required to keep internal conflicts from being expressed overtly.
We have all known people who were like a bomb with a short fuse, ready to explode at the slightest pressure. Unable to resolve such conflict, symbolic defense mechanisms are often brought into play in order to cope. This does not mean that the defense mechanisms are successful, but that they are the best the individual has achieved. Compulsive behavior is common. This may take the form of ritualistic movements repeated over and over, symbolically dealing with a problem. One common example is ritualistic hand washing, supposedly to alleviate some real or imagined guilt. Driving in to Miami today, I saw a man walking the white line that edged the outer lane. High speed traffic whizzed by just inches from this man, but it was not enough to deter him from his compulsion to walk the line.
Such symbology is very personal, its exact meaning particular to the individual. That a particular symbol can be dependably interpreted to have a specific universal meaning is another flawed Freudian concept.
Talking to one's self is another common mechanism. The individual imagines a scenario in which the problem is being resolved, or in which he/she is gaining some gratification. Many people are continuously running such scenarios in their minds as they attempt to fit the real world to their belief structure. The conversations attempt to depict that individual as successfully dealing with a problem. What cannot be achieved in real life is somewhat achieved in fantasy.
Most of us are not apt to hallucinate in order to protect a false belief. If someone thrusts the truth under our nose, we are apt to accept the reality of it. A person with deep religious convictions, or other serious belief pathology, deeply vested, will often convince themselves that it didn't happen, a negative hallucination. Any argument in support of religion can be placed in one of eight categories, all of which have been refuted. To any religionist, however, the invalidation of those arguments never occurred.
Religion is the foremost repository and teacher of organized untruth. Its teachings provide a foundation for most, if not all, psychological and social pathology. This cannot be stressed too strongly. Religious teachings, distorting one's perception of existence, permeate virtually all societies, generating the misdirection, and insuring the ignorance that attends every belief. The reasoning patterns and activities of religionists is an area where the effects of belief clearly stand out.
Religion's main line of defense is the ignorance the individual maintains in order to keep the faith, being unable to recognize the absurdities and failing to question its teachings. Indeed, its greatest asset is the popular belief that religion is a 'good' and that to question constitutes committing a 'sin'. The language of religion is couched in phraseology dripping with sacrosanctity and reverence. We have been carefully taught.
In a predominantly rational society religious teachings would be recognized as fallacious, They would be analyzed in terms of their real effects. They would exposed for what they are and the religions brought to task for foisting falsehoods upon the public. They would be attacked, just as we would attack any other social pathology. We do not accept poisons, drugs or even tobacco to be in the hands of our children, yet we deliberately infuse them with mental poison, fantasy and delusion that cripples their minds, implanting learning disabilities that few will ever overcome.
We do not permit dangerous materials to be in the market place without warning labels, yet we eagerly expose ourselves to the delusions of religion. In terms of the over-all dementing effect religion has on any society, by comparison, its cumulative effects are far more detrimental than alcohol and drugs combined. Without religion and the authoritarian oppression it generates and supports, popular rationality levels would probably be high enough that drugs and alcohol would be minor problems or no problem at all.
In as much as the individual cognizance is the predominant determinant of human behavior, there are some important yet simple implications of the belief system which you should be cognizant of regardless of your station in life.
First, an individual with serious belief system pathology will have serious areas of irrationality. Such an individual will also be deficient in factual knowledge in areas of his or her beliefs.
Such an individual may try to fake rationality but can succeed only on a superficial level, lacking a necessary understanding of relationships, principals and insights for broad-range rational functionality. Low or narrow-spectrum knowledge and functionality is to be expected in individuals with high levels of belief system pathology.
Such individuals tend to be like a 'ticking bomb'. They will be highly reactive to information that threatens their beliefs. They will be in a constant state of denial and will constantly struggle with the problems of maintaining the beliefs. This will call for great energy to be used in avoiding information and in controlling emotionality and behavior. There will also be a serious need to insulate themselves within their own groups.
Conversely, broad factual knowledge and a good understanding of basic physical principles constitute a reliable indicator of a healthy cognitive system and of rationality, although one must be alert for narrow-range fixations which may be symptomatic of an area of serious false belief. Remember that an individual can be rational in most areas yet be completely psychotic in a narrow range of cognizance. One does not usually find such insulation around the pathology, however. More often a serious belief pathology will tend to generalize to other areas, distorting a large part of the personality, and affecting a wide range of behavior.
Cognizance, ultimately perception, is the great determinant of human behavior. More than any other factor, it will determine one's activities. Belief, as a part of that cognizance, supports and drives the misdirection of individuals and our institutions. Belief systems are insulated to the degree that the institutions of every society have made them taboo. The time has come, however, when Homo sapiens must become a self-correcting species or degenerate, laying waste the Earth environment in the process. That self-correction cannot be achieved without a species-wide assessment and correction of cognitive systems by individuals. No cause, no course of action, has approached the importance of this in human history. It will ultimately determine the continued evolution or devolution of intelligent life on Earth.
Any institution will have pockets of pathology. The same holds true for our academic disciplines. Psychology is severely limited and damaged by defective systems of thought. Most prominent among these is Freudian Psychology, its stronghold is Psychiatry. Although I object to nearly all Freudian psychology on the basis that it fails to recognize the real nature of functional mental illness, it has become the defacto guardian of mental health and its use, to some degree, is inescapable.
In this role as the broker of mental health, its accommodation of mental pathology and its unrealistic labeling of symptoms, conditions and processes, particularly its 'diseasing' of the human species by defining new categories of behavior which it labels as a disease, have seriously retarded progress in the field of psychology and functions as a barrier to correction. In this role of the accepted authority in mental health, and relevant to the 'diseasing' mentioned above, 'creating disease' by defining new categories, it increasingly brings more human behavior under its authority, supporting and increasing the caretaker mentality of officialdom.
Psychiatry has become one of our most powerful institutions, having been given official sanction as the caretaker of mental health, a position not limited to this society, but which it has achieved throughout a large part of the world. The real irony is that Psychiatry, per se, is the least equipped to be effective in this role, just as religion is the least equipped to be the source or broker of morality. Many trained in this discipline have come to recognize its failings and, although still categorized as Psychiatrists, have migrated to alternative concepts and approaches.
For all its wide-spread acceptance, Psychiatry is virtually useless in the alleviation of mental illness and, to the contrary, compounds problems through the wasting of resources, the negative effects of encouraging dependency and its propensity toward the maintenance of delusions, both within its own ranks and among those subjected to it. In most mental institutions, attempts at rehabilitation are being increasingly abandoned in favor of controlling behavior by chemistry. True rehabilitation requires new knowledge and the dissolving of beliefs.
Although Grandfather Freud is to be commended for his efforts in lifting mental illness out of the clutches of religious superstition, with torture at the hands of ignorant and superstitions asylum caretakers trying to drive out the demons, his work is of little value. In short, it doesn't work.
Interestingly, there has been more written with a Freudian slant or underpinnings than any other form of psychology, literally enough to fill freedomries, all of it virtually useless. Well, why not? It provides a safe haven for practically all of our fantasies, it provides the illusion of doing something about our problems and its failures can be routinely projected onto the patient. Notice any resemblance to religion?
There is a difference between a working premise and a belief. Both are comprised of internalized cognitive material, having the power to motivate the individual and influence behavior, but here the similarity ends.
A working premise is recognized as a temporary basis for activity and, as such, there is little resistance to it being modified or replaced as more information is acquired. A belief is seen as an ultimate answer to some question, with no expectation of modification or replacement. It becomes a foundation stone, as it were, supporting a host of other ideas. Vested interest in a belief can become magnitudes greater than that for a working premise.
Support for a belief is a fabrication process since a belief can never be supported by real evidence. If a belief is supportable by real evidence, it is not a belief, but knowledge. Further, any supporting material for a belief is, itself, devoid of any real support. Maintenance of the belief, or any such supportive material, requires additional false material and an absence of relevant knowledge. Protecting a belief is an exclusion process, as well as a fabrication process.
The RCE mechanism, which protects the cognitive structure, and which any defense mechanism is a manifestation of, will be reactive in direct proportion to vested interest.
A close examination of these mechanisms and processes reveals belief to have implications far beyond the concept of merely holding an idea or system of ideas. It is a complex syndrome which blocks access to factual information in any area that constitutes a threat to the belief. A belief is not merely an idea, it generates a belief/ignorance syndrome.
Any emerging intelligent life form will generate the Belief/Ignorance syndrome as it gains in awareness of it's environment. To long endure, intelligent life must successfully breach this barrier and move beyond, recognizing the delusions for what they are and losing them. Otherwise, the species will destroy its environment and precipitate a premature degeneration, which would entail mass extinctions of other life forms as the parasitical species ravages its own environment.
The Belief/Ignorance syndrome becomes a critical barrier, if not a lethal threat, when a species achieves technology, gaining significant control over disease and enhanced facility in the tapping and utilization of natural resources. These advancements encourage higher population and hasten the destruction of the environment. The belief/ignorance syndrome renders the group, and ultimately the species, unable to establish and sustain corrective directions.
As population growth rates sharply increase (thanks to the technology), resource usage increases, pollution and waste levels rise faster than they can be degraded. At our present stage of species development, technological and scientific facility has been achieved while populations remained largely mired in cultural myth and superstition, high levels of belief resulting in ignorance and diminished mentality, preventing the correction of defective social structures.
As population densities increase and the environment's carrying capacity is progressively destroyed, the species is confronted with the problem of quickly shedding its cultural myths and superstitions within a progressively shrinking time frame. Without populations largely oriented to reality, the means to progress further will be destroyed.
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